Lloyd x Raine Part 1 of 3

It had only taken 3 months for Lloyd to convince everyone in Tethe'alla and Sylvarant to throw away all their expheres, but it was a long 3 months. Lloyd had returned just in time for his eighteenth birthday, and a month later he bought his own house in Flanoir. He was finally ready to end all the excitement. After all, he had done more than any other 18 year old ever. But, for some reason, he still felt like there was something that he still hadn't done that was greater than anything he had ever done before. He had never been in love.

At first he thought Colette was his true love, but she was just too much of a kid. She was more like a sister to him than a lover. Lloyd tried to find the right girl, but he was too embarrassed to ask anyone out.

One day, Raine and Genis came over to his house for a visit. Lloyd was delighted and decided to let them stay for a few days. They were still on their journey to eliminate discrimination against half-elves. That night, when the others were asleep, Lloyd was still awake, sitting on the couch. He still felt the emptiness in his heart. He heard the creak of a door opening. He looked to the top of the stairs and saw Raine coming out of a room.

"Oh, hey Professor Sage," he said in complete monotone.

"You don't have to call me that anymore, you're all grown-up now." She said as she descended the stairs. She sat on the couch next to Lloyd. "What's wrong, Lloyd?"

"Nothing, its just… I feel like there's something missing in my life," he answered.

"I see, you wish you had someone to hold on to when you're feeling bad and love for eternity?" She answered jokingly.

"Wow, am I really that obvious?" He asked in reply.

"I tell you what, how about tomorrow we go down to the park and find you a girlfriend?" she asked. They agreed on the idea and went to bed.

The next day the three went down to the park. Genis saw the huge jungle gym and instantly darted over to go play with the other kids. Raine giggled.

"No matter how smart he is, he's still a little boy." She said. "Oh, come on. Lets go do something fun, were bound to find someone our age if we go to the right places!" Lloyd remembered that him and the professor actually weren't that far apart age-wise. Normally she seemed much older, but today she was wearing her dancing outfit from the incident with the fake summon spirit and she looked no older than Lloyd. And so the two began their journey to find Lloyd's soul mate. First they headed for an ice-cream shop. They walked in casually, and ordered a couple of scoops. They split up so as not to look like a couple. A cute girl walked into the store that looked around Lloyd's age. Raine signaled for him to move in. He slowly trudged over to about 4 feet away from her.

"H…h.h….h..he….hey…u…u.ummmm…oh god," suddenly he realized that she had already taken her ice cream and left. He walked over to where Raine was.

"This isn't working, lets try somewhere else." And so the two continued their journey and came to an alleyway. They heard a voice call over to them.

"Hey, wanna join us?" they heard. They looked over to see a bunch of kids around 19-20 playing spin-the-bottle.

"This is the perfect opportunity Lloyd! Of course we'll join you!" Raine said.

"Wait, Raine, are you sure…" but Raine dragging him over to the area where the kids were playing cut him off.

"Here are the rules," one of the boys projected to the group of eight boys and eight girls. None of them seemed to even know each other, so it was the perfect chance to meet someone new. "If you land on someone of the opposite gender, you two have to kiss. If you land on someone of the same gender, that person has to go next." The boy then sat down and span the bottle. He landed on the girl sitting next to her, and the kissed. She spun the bottle and kissed another boy. When that boy spun the bottle, it landed on Lloyd.

"Looks like its your turn, guy," one of the girls said flirtatiously. Lloyd took a deep breath and hoped it would land on a boy so he wouldn't have to kiss anyone. The bottle spun for what seemed like an eternity to Lloyd. Finally the bottle slowed to a stop and his destiny was sealed.

The bottle had chosen Raine.